My dad. His silent nod is a tug on the leash, and I’m overcome with resentment. Fear. Regret. There isn’t any part of me stupid enough to think the other shoe isn’t going to finally drop, and I walk over, jaw tight, steeling myself.
“You can run,” he starts to say as I approach, his smile waxy and pliable, “but you can’t hide.” The way his features slot in and out of malice is disturbing, and I can’t help but wonder if I used to do that. If I oscillated between performances to get what I needed in such an obvious way.
I shove my hands into the pockets of my letterman. “Was I running, or just at a game?” I tilt my head, trying to remain unaffected, but his amusement flattens into something sinister. My stomach drops.
“Cut the shit, Andrew.” He pauses, scanning my face, and I wait, internally frozen. “That was you in my office.” A statement, but I attempt to refute it anyway.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. Is there something you need or?—”
“Something I need,” he mutters, and he’s agitated. My mind spins, and I think he knows I haven’t been playing my part. “This is about what you need. Always has been. But I think you forgot you needmyhelp a lot more than I need yours,” he spits, and I hate that I flinch.
A false memory of him slapping Ian playsacross my memory, and my skin crawls. All the money in the world can’t erase his violence, and maybe I should’ve known that but I didn’t. Overeagerness will do that to you—make you naive.
I glance over my shoulder, sensing someone’s attention, and catch the red glow of brake lights as Grant’s truck speeds out into the black night.
“I asked you about Elliot. I told you I need more information.”
“You haven’t told me shit.” The heat of his voice turns into frost as he steps toward me, and the height difference is exaggerated. I lift my chin and look down on him, and watch his nostrils flare at the insult.
“Can’t make up information, Glenn. Maybe Scott could give it a try for you,” I tell him, walking a thin line. It’s worth it, I think, to rile him up, at least a little. But when he huffs, the laughter is sick, sends a chill through my spine, and if I could press my heel into him like an insect, I probably would.
“You’re not half as stupid as I thought.” He walks back to his car, and I’m sure he’s going to leave. Victorious relief starts to wash over me, just as he turns back around.
He lights a cigarette. Leans back against the car door. Smiles, slowly. Then, my phone rings.
Molars grinding, I check the ID.
“Mom?” My voice wants to shake, but I ground myself for her sake. “What’s up?”
“Uhm,” her voice is muffled, and I can imagine her sitting at the table, head in her hands. “Do you think you can talk to someone at your school about those conservatory scholarships? For Carm?” Her voice breaks when she says my sister’s name, and I look up to find Glenn’s vindictiveness bleeding into the otherwise innocent night. “They, uh…they pulled it. I can probably pay a quarter of it. Maybe if?—”
“Of course. I’ll figure it out. I promise.” She sniffs,and I know she’s nodding. “Seriously. Don’t worry about this, okay? I’ll handle it.”
“Yeah, okay,” she says, her voice gritty from tears that I know she’s trying hard to rein in. “You get in okay? Jesus—how was the game?” It comes out so quietly. Painfully.
“We can talk about it tomorrow,” I tell her, wishing I could fix everything now. Hating that I did this to begin with.
“But you won, right?” I hear her throat bob on the other end of the line.
“’Course we won. Get some sleep.” I hang up before she can say anything else.
I hold Glenn’s gaze, watch him blow a plume of smoke in my face as I step forward.“Was that really necessary?”
“You tell me. Did you really have to go behind my back? Team up with my son?” His eyes crinkle with feigned sincerity, and I almost laugh.
“You mean my brother? Am I not your son, too?” It’s the oddest feeling, but there’s this bone-deep sadness when I ask him, and it wraps itself around my disgust. It cracks itself against my soul, wondering if deep inside me I’ll find what I’m seeing in him.
His lips twitch. “A waste, isn’t it? To have two perfectly useless sons?” The words are leaden in my gut. There is, I think, some small part of me that will never stop wanting his approval, no matter how much he hurts me. The disappointment must flash across my features because he stands up taller and slots into a new expression. “You can still prove yourself. To me. The chairman of the conservatory’s board is just a phone call away.”
I almost want to ask him how many people he’s got, how many people he’s a phone call away from black mailing, but I don’t actually want to know. I want to be done with all of this.Want to be clean of whatever the fuck he’s doing. It hasn’t been until now that I’ve considered I may never be.
“What do you need?”Deceive, deceive, deceive.
“It’s your lucky day. You get to pick,” he whispers. “Chapman’s being difficult about coming back to Astor. Get him here, and consider yourself back in my good graces.Oryou let me know what the Fielder girl is saying to that reporter. If you want to sweeten the deal, get me a recording of?—”
“Absolutely not.” Adrenaline threatens to rip the bones of my chest apart and I feel horrible. Fragile. “Nothing on Sloane. She’s off limits.”
He sucks his teeth, glancing at the ground before shooting his narrowed gaze back up to me. “You don’t know this girl, Andrew. Swearing allegiance…” he shakes his head, turning around to pop his door open before facing back to me with an overstuffed file in his hands. “Here.”
